CiteScore: 3.51ℹ
CiteScore measures the average citations received per document published in this title. CiteScore values are based on citation counts in a given year (e.g. 2015) to documents published in three previous calendar years (e.g. 2012 – 14), divided by the number of documents in these three previous years (e.g. 2012 – 14).

Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP): 1.956ℹSource Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP):2017: 1.956SNIP measures contextual citation impact by weighting citations based on the total number of citations in a subject field.

SCImago Journal Rank (SJR): 3.048ℹSCImago Journal Rank (SJR):2017: 3.048SJR is a prestige metric based on the idea that not all citations are the same. SJR uses a similar algorithm as the Google page rank; it provides a quantitative and a qualitative measure of the journal’s impact.

Author StatsℹAuthor Stats:Publishing your article with us has many benefits, such as having access to a personal dashboard: citation and usage data on your publications in one place. This free service is available to anyone who has published and whose publication is in Scopus.

Regulatory Goals in a Globalized World

Ng, Sharon and Rajeev Batra

Scientific Abstract

This research examines the impact of a salient global (or local) identity on individual's regulatory goals. Specifically, we show that when people's identity as a global citizen is salient, they are more likely to focus on promotion goals; whereas when their identity as a local citizen is salient, they are more likely to focus on prevention goals. We further show that this arises because people are likely to adopt a more abstract or higher level (versus concrete or lower level) construal when their global (local) identity is salient. Evidence from three studies supports this central proposition.

Media Abstract

A few months ago, the people of England voted to take Britain out of the European Union (EU). Proponents of the “stay in EU” camp focused on the potential growth and economic gains remaining in EU would yield, whereas proponents of the “leave” camp focused on protecting their jobs and England’s identity. This difference in perspectives leads one to wonder what may have led to such dramatically different points-of-view within the country. Our research shows how the twin forces of globalization and localization can lead to important differences in mind-set, that change how people form their social and political views, and choose among brands.

Globalization has been shown to lead to the development of a global identity (i.e., how strongly one associates with the global community) and the strengthening of one’s local identity (i.e., one’s association with the local community) (e.g., Arnett 2002; Chiu et al. 2011; Leung et al. 2012). The question we are interested in is: what are the implications of such developments? Does it affect the type of goals people strive for? Prior research shows that people possess two primary types of regulatory goals, promotion and prevention (Higgins 1997). Though research has identified some important antecedents of these regulatory goals (e.g., parenting style: Higgins et al 2001; self-construal: Aaker and Lee 2001), the literature has not yet explored the intriguing possibility that differential salience of one’s global vs. local identity might itself be an important antecedent.

Our research shows that when their global identity is strong, people will focus on promotion goals such as growth and advancement. On the other hand, when their local identity is strong, people tend to focus on prevention goals such as roles and responsibilities. Our three studies show that a salient global identity leads to more abstract and distant thoughts and stronger promotion goals, whereas a salient local identity leads to more concrete and immediate thoughts, and stronger prevention goals. These important findings were replicated across different measures (self-reported measures and behavioral outcomes) and priming methods. The findings were also corroborated with data from the World Values Survey (2014).

Our findings can be used to explain many aspects of human behavior. For example, in the Brexit situation, those who voted to remain in EU have been shown to be more educated and globally mobile, i.e., people who tend to possess a strong global identity. These people focus more on the economic benefits of staying in the EU and how it might be beneficial to their own career advancement. On the other hand, those who voted to leave EU cited the need to reinforce the British identity as one of the reasons for their support of the leave camp. Reports from the popular press shows that these voters tend to focus on their British identity and a more protectionist goal. Though our studies do not specifically examine the Brexit situation, our findings can partially explain what might have run through these voters’ minds. We also study how these changes affect consumer responses to brands and advertisements.

Beyond Brexit, more generally, as the world becomes more connected and globalized, we also see a paradoxical rise of ethnocentrism.. Increasingly, many countries are witnessing a split in the population on the issue of immigration (e.g., Singapore, United States, Hong Kong). There are people who feel a strong need to protect their local identity and fulfill one’s roles and responsibilities to their countrymen. On the flip side, there are also people who feel that it would be impractical to close the country’s doors to foreign talents and opportunities as these can help the country to grow and stay relevant to the world. Though our findings cannot resolve this dilemma, they can help to provide a deeper understanding of how these differences come about.

Thus, findings from our research provide answers to a piece of the puzzle to help us understand how people’s goals shift as the world becomes more globalized, and the implications of such changes. We believe our findings would be of interest to companies and policy makers at large.